


This Story’s Missing a Wishing Well

by theplushfrog



Category: DRAMAtical Murder
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Aoba is dead, Body Dysphoria, Cannibalistic Thoughts, Disturbing Themes, Hallucinations, Hurt/Comfort, I'll add more ships as they appear, M/M, Ren in Aoba's body, also VriTrip trash will make an appearance later, implied Mink death, well Reason is dead
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-08-25
Updated: 2014-08-25
Packaged: 2018-02-14 16:17:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,025
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2198487
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theplushfrog/pseuds/theplushfrog
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What if Ren woke up in Aoba's body... sans both Reason and Desire?  Set after Ren's Bad End.</p>
            </blockquote>





	This Story’s Missing a Wishing Well

**Author's Note:**

> Content warning: disturbing hallucinations including but not limited to insects, cannibalism, and body dysphoria. There will probably be more warnings later.

Slowly, slowly, he rose from the depths of dreams and nightmares. It had been a long time since he had slept -- was it always like this?

What.

That didn’t make sense.

The beeps and whine of monitors dragged his thoughts to the world outside of his mind and his eyes cracked open.

This was wrong.

“Master! You’re awake! Hold on-- let me get the others!”

The sound of footsteps made him dizzy. He shifted and felt a pressure in his arm. Pain…?

“ _Aoba_.”

“Aoba, are you okay?” Pink…? “Clear get his nurse.”

Oh right… He blinked and the world came into focus. Koujaku stood over him, expression twisted somewhere between relief and worry. A white head of hair disappeared into the hallway. And…

“Tae-san?”

“Ehhh?” She sounded alarmed, her gaze suddenly zeroing in on him with an intensity that made the rising anxiety inside him flare.

“Where’s Aoba?” Ren blinked up at her, shifting to rub his eye--wait. Wait. He stared at the hand brought to his face. That’s not right. He’s not supposed to be _human_. “--Where’s Aoba? What happened? _Where is Aoba!?_ ”

\--

Aoba’s Scrap had failed.

“When we couldn’t wake Master up, Noiz-san pulled us from the Rhyme Field.” Clear sat nearby, everyone else had left. Ren wasn’t sure why Clear was allowed to stay. He wasn’t sure Clear was _actually_ allowed to stay, but this was confusing and terrifying enough without Clear’s usual strangeness compounding it. “Mink-san left after that and then the tower fell down! BOOM! --It was very exciting, Ren-san!”

After some explaining of… himself and his purpose for Aoba, Ren had observed the different emotions that crossed everyone’s faces. Koujaku’s face closed off and became harsh with denial. Tae-san had ordered him to leave when he began to get angry. Ren could not talk much, as Aoba’s voice was raw from disuse.

No. Not Aoba’s voice. His voice.

He had searched and searched, but there was no feeling of Aoba in his head now.

Everytime he closed his (Aoba’s) eyes, he reached for any feeling of Aoba.

So that meant-- in Scrap-- he really had--

(His mind skittered away from the thought, it was too fresh, and too painful.)

Tae had waited for the nurse to come and check up on Aob--his body. She had asked him that if Aoba came back to tell her right away, and then she left too.

Ren still wasn’t sure why Clear was here.

His allmate body was curled up on the chair to the side. It was turned off, but it was still altogether strange to see it separate from himself. All those years.

All that time with Aob--

Clear paused in his retelling of something Ren had zoned out on, watching the tears suddenly pour from Ren’s (Aoba’s) face. “Ren-san?”

He shook his head, draping his arms across his face. He didn’t have the strength to sit up. His mind was so hollow, so cold. He reached for Aoba but there was no warmth, no Reason nor Desire. Just Restraint. “I can’t..” His (Aoba’s) throat hurt too much.

“I’ll find him, Ren-san. Don’t worry.”

Ren didn’t know when, but Clear left sometime after he had cried himself to exhaustion. When he was woken by the nurse for another checkup, the gas-mask-wearing man was gone.

\--

Mizuki came to visit now and then throughout his hospital stay. Apparently he had woken up and began recovering several months before Ren had woken up (even now, he’s not sure he should have ever woken up). His fragile recovery had given them hope for Aoba’s recovery.

Too bad that wasn’t the case.

Mizuki was good about talking him through the hallucinations, however. When Ren woke up still trapped within a nightmare (beyond the one that was the real world), it was often Mizuki who talked him out of it. Sometimes Koujaku or Tae too.

Clear had disappeared. No one knew where he had gone.

Mink never showed up either, but Noiz did, surprisingly.

Noiz had made a strange expression when confronted with Ren. Pseudorabbit had chimed “Impossible! Impossible! Immmmpossiiiblllle!” several times before Noiz told him to be quiet. Ren had exhausted himself trying to explain and simply watched Noiz stare him over. A minute. Five minutes. And then Noiz left without saying another word.

Ren didn’t know what to make of that.

Humans were strange.

Beni agreed with that idea when Ren offered it during a moment when Koujaku had left to use the bathroom during another visit.

“Sooooo what’s it like?”

“What is?”

“Being human DUH! You gotta spill!” Beni fluttered his wings in a huff before resettling upon Ren’s head.

Ren was quiet, contemplating his friend’s question for a long moment. “...Different.”

“WHAAAA?! That’s it?! That’s all I get?!!!” Beni squawked and pecked at Ren’s head.

“--Ow --Beni please.” Ren touched his head as Beni flew to sit on the windowsill. “I don’t know how to express it fully in words. I was originally human, but had forgotten for a long time, so that makes this all the more strange. Being an allmate was fine, but being human is just… different. That dog body was never my own, and… neither is this body.” He trailed off, deflating in the kind of emotional exhaustion that was now common for him whenever Aoba came up (a lot).

“Oi, oi. I didn’t mean to upset you, idiot.” Beni shifted awkwardly.

“It’s fine.” Ren didn’t look at him. He had trouble remembering to use human expressions, but much of the time it was easier that he not even try. He glanced up as Koujaku came back through the doorway.

“Yo, I’m back.”

“Welcome back.” Ren said automatically, echoing Beni. Koujaku gave him a weird look, and Ren turned his gaze back to the floor.

\--

They had sometimes needed to restrain Ren during a bad episode until someone could sedate him, or they could talk him down. One of the first times he woke back up with nightmares still trying to bleed into his reality, Mizuki had spoken gently to him until the air stopped filling with scratches and his skin stopped itching like bugs crawled under it.

“You feeling better now, Ren?”

 _This skin isn’t yours_ , the insects whispered.

“It’s fine.”

\--

Mizuki spoke kindly to Ren, telling stories of Aoba, Koujaku, and him getting drunk and the dumb things they got into when hanging out together. Ren knew the story. He had been there too, he wanted to say, but didn’t. He stopped himself from trying to claw the insects out. Darkness pounded on the window, but Mizuki didn’t see it so it must not be real.

Koujaku came somedays instead and told Ren stories of Aoba and his childhood, and how he always beat off the bullies. Ren wanted to say he was there and he remembered those things, but he didn’t. He watched the cracks forming all over Koujaku’s face, like fissures to pits of hell. Demons stared back through the cracks, but Koujaku never screamed so it must not be real.

Tae brought Ren food ( once he could eat solids) and would speak softly of Aoba’s parents and remind him that they were his parents too. Ren let her voice drive away all the monsters lurking inside his veins, watching them, and his blood, flow out of the doorway with the sound of her voice. He felt so weak as his blood left his body but he tried to eat her food, because he knew Aoba had loved it, but the feeling in his mouth would always bring the monsters back inside.

They knew. They knew what he had done.

But Tae didn’t yell at the monsters, nor call the nurse about the blood, she only wiped his face and patted him on the head. The monsters weren’t real, and his blood was still inside him… but Ren still sometimes couldn’t believe in reality unless someone was there to show him what was real and what wasn’t.

\--

His recovery went faster than Mizuki’s, the nurses claimed it was because they were used to dealing with mental attacks now after caring for all the people affected by Morphine.

(Ren was pretty sure it was more because Aoba had taken most of the damage rather than himself, but he kept those thoughts to himself.)

Laying in a hospital bed all day still wasn’t good for anyone’s body, nonetheless someone recovering from a mental attack gone terribly wrong, so Ren was released with appointments set up for rehab and medication to deal with his (growing rarer) hallucinations and (even rarer) breaks with reality.

Tae told Ren that she had personally helped the hospital formulate the medication back when the tower had first fallen. She said it was the least she could do.

So Ren made sure to take his medication, even though it made him even more tired than his (Aoba’s) weakened body already was. He didn’t want to hurt any of Aoba’s precious friends (even if by simply living, he was doing just that).

At first Ren simply followed Tae around. She gave him bags of herbs and medicine to carry as he followed her on her appointments around the island. Ren noticed that she never went beyond a certain limit that proved to be within his stamina. As he grew stronger, she had him carry heavier and heavier bags and they walked farther and farther, until she started yelling at him that she needed her space.

Ren’s pretty sure she was just being typical Tae and yelling at him to express her concern for how much time he spent at home or with her.. but it’s also true that he was an awkward addition to her visits with clients.

Koujaku still came to visit often, although the house was not as warm or lively as it had been before with Aoba.

Koujaku sometimes would spend the whole night seemingly ignoring him and only talking with Tae. Ren wasn’t used to speaking, or being spoken to, so it served him fine to be ignored. Beni would usually come nest in his hair as they both listened to Koujaku and Tae chattering away in the living room.

The former-allmate was quiet as he asked, “Do you think Koujaku will ever forgive me?”

Ren felt Beni shift, but he kept his usually loud voice low. “Whaaa? Don’t you think he’s already forgiven you? Idiot-dog, you’re not even at fault!”

Ren looked down at the warm mug between his hands, the table had grown heated under his fingertips. “Aoba isn’t here for him to be angry at.”

“Hmpth. Still doesn’t mean he’s dumb enough to find you at fault for Aoba’s idiocy.”

Sighing, Ren fiddled with the ends of his (Aoba’s) hair. The hair was growing darker, more the color of Ren’s previous Online self than Aoba’s bright blue. It was strange and made Ren uncertain.

Still, Beni plucked and preened at his scalp, and Ren winced more from the odd feeling than pain. “Do you even comb this mess?! It’s a disaster!” They hadn’t cut his (Aoba’s) hair during the hospital stay (Tae or Koujaku had probably asked them not to, what with Aoba’s sensitivity with his hair) but Ren couldn’t bring himself to cut it now either. He couldn’t feel much, if at all with his (Aoba’s) hair anymore, so there was no reason to leave it long...

Opening his mouth to answer, Ren was cut off by Koujaku returning to the kitchen. “Beni, stop that.” There was a strange tone to his voice, but Ren didn’t understand it. Beni flittered away, grumbling under breath about stupid masters.

“A literal bird’s nest, with how much time your allmate spends in it.” Tae chuckled, still sitting in the living room. “Why don’t you help him out, Koujaku?” Ren was sure if she could see the expression on Koujaku’s face she would not have spoken.

“It’s late. I must be going. Thank you for everything, Tae-san. ...Have a goodnight, Ren.”

Ren watched the door slide shut after Koujaku’s departure. Tae looked puzzled, then looked sad, like she had remembered something she hadn’t meant to. Ren quietly escaped upstairs.


End file.
